Show HN: My first web app trains your ears

Show HN: My first web app trains your ears(earbuilder.com)

10 points by mgallivan 13 years ago | 7 comments

Hi HN,

I've been taking guitar lessons and one thing that is recommended to most musicians is ear training - where two different notes are played and you must identify the number of steps between the notes. My app, Earbuilder, should help with that process.

You can find it here: http://www.earbuilder.com/

It's my first web app, and my first real foray into JavaScript. You can take a look at the source and you'll see that it's pretty poorly structured, but I've picked up a book and hopefully things will improve with my second web application.

Please let me know if you have any comments, suggestions, or hate because I'm looking to improve this over the coming weeks!

strangestchild 13 years ago |

Big fan of this app - definitely something I'll make use of.

One idea though: something that as a singer I would find useful is the ability to select a single base note and practice against that but without the base note being played each time - if that makes sense.

This would be handy because a big challenge for singers (or players of instruments without clear note separation) is placing the notes you hear relative to the key you're in.

I realise it's a lightweight app and making it too feature-rich wouldn't necessarily be a good thing, but I know a lot of people would find it helpful.

mgallivan 13 years ago | |

That's awesome feedback and something I wouldn't have come up with - so thank a lot! I'm going to release a newer version with more "Settings" options so that people can customize a bit more.

mgallivan 13 years ago |

(I suck at HN. I thought I could post text AND a link... anyway, here's what I wrote.)

Hi HN,

You can find it here: http://www.earbuilder.com/

Please let me know if you have any comments, suggestions, or hate because I'm looking to improve this over the coming weeks!

arxanas 13 years ago |

I like the idea, and I'd like to use it, but...

• How can I have it play chords instead of just intervals?

• Bug: suppose I select A and Unison, press Play, then answer Unison. When I play again, two apparently separate instances of the sound are played. This is extensible for multiple notes/intervals

mgallivan 13 years ago | |

Thanks for the reply,

- That's not a feature yet but I'll definitely add it to the todo list since people train in both ways.

- Whenever you answer, the sound plays again: if you get it wrong it repeats, if you get it correct then it plays a new interval. But I can see how that isn't clear so I'll change the wording / possibly animations.

Thanks again!

dm2 13 years ago |

Looks awesome, great idea!

I have one feature suggestion, could you make a demo mode or way to preview the sounds. I do not have an ear for notes and have no way to learn the sounds. The functionality might already be built in, I couldn't figure out where it was though.

mgallivan 13 years ago | |

I don't quite understand what you mean by preview the sounds? Do you mean like previewing the intervals? I can add small buttons next to each to give you a glimpse - thanks for the suggestion!

I was mostly going off the assumption that people would select one or two intervals at a time, learn them through error, and then select a few more but this is an easy change for more clarification.